


What's the Point?

by FanOfFandoms



Series: It's All About Trust [1]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: AU, F/M, Post-1x05, possible touchy subject throughout, some violent-y bits, swearing too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-15
Updated: 2014-12-18
Packaged: 2018-02-04 18:20:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 18,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1788670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FanOfFandoms/pseuds/FanOfFandoms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Following the events of 'the Girl in the Flower Dress', Skye receives the fall-out of her actions from the team. Running away is never the answer, so when her past catches up with her, things get a hell of a lot worse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Why Should I Stay?

Skye knew that the team’s reactions would be bad. She had prepared herself for being ignored, having dirty looks thrown at her and not being trusted. She was ready for that because she had, after all, been untruthful and she knew how much that could hurt.

At first, she’d thought that the bracelet Coulson gave her was a peace-offering; something to say that he wasn’t completely annoyed at her, that he wanted her to stay. It only took a few days to realise that she was wrong.

The bracelet put her under S.H.I.E.L.D.’s control; she had to do anything they wanted and it could stop her from doing pretty much anything. She wondered whether they’d just use the bracelet to monitor her. She thought they’d probably do what they did with Miles; stop her from using technology. It hit her that, without her hacking skills... what was her purpose on the team?

Then came the realisation that perhaps she didn’t have one.

* * *

She woke up early the day after the fiasco with Miles, leaving her room in her pyjamas, not really caring who she bumped into; the majority of the team should be used to seeing her in her bunny-patterned pyjama bottoms by now anyway.

Her hair was falling out of the bun she’d thrown it in the night before, so she didn’t see Ward straight away. When she brushed the hair out of her eyes and caught sight of him, she froze. He was sat at the breakfast bar, head down as he stared into his coffee.

“Hi,” she said quietly. He glanced up, looking at her for a second before looking down again, remaining silent. “Okaaayy...” she said, dragging the word out to try to break the awkward air in the room.

She reached over the counter to switch the kettle on (Coulson always had a thing about making sure all of the switches were turned off if not in use – something she tended to forget constantly), pulling away hurriedly as an electric shock went up her arm.

“Son of a bitch!” she exclaimed, glaring at the kettle.

“You probably shouldn’t do that,” Ward said, his voice cold and detached as he stood up and walked away. Skye just gaped at his back, watching as he left.

*. . .*

Though she could use technology again a few days after the kettle incident (she figured it had just been a warning to her: ‘don’t contact any of your Rising Tide friends again’), she found that the team’s attitudes around her were all the same. No one could even look at her, and Coulson had done absolutely nothing, to her knowledge, to help her find her parents in the week since he’d found out, despite the fact that they’d simply been flying around. Whenever she tried to talk to someone, they’d either ignore her, or walk away. The only exception was Simmons, who would look sympathetic, perhaps murmur an apology, but not answer all the same.

The weeks passed slowly; Skye found she generally wasn’t trusted enough to be given a specific job on any mission, and when she worked her hacktivist magic to get the team out of trouble, she didn’t receive a thank you, or even an acknowledgement of her work. The team would simply go about their business, and Skye really was starting to wonder if they even knew she was there.

Three weeks after she'd been given her bracelet, and she had had just about enough. So when Coulson announced that they’d be landing in LA for a few days to pick up supplies and that the team had a few days down-time, she decided to do something about it.

*. . .*

“Hey... do you have the keys for my van?” Skye asked one of the people at the airstrip. He frowned at her confusedly. “My van,” she repeated, pointed it out in the large car park, “I need the keys. I left them here about two months ago?” The man shrugged.

“They’re probably in the office,” he said, moving to walk away.

“Well can you _get_ them?” Skye asked, starting to get annoyed. The man sighed, but unlocked the office, re-emerging with her keys a moment later.

“These them?” he asked. Skye nodded.

“Thanks,” she muttered, picking up the bag she’d packed the night before and heading over to her van. She sighed happily as she unlocked the door, throwing her bag inside and looking towards the Bus one last time.

She’d made the decision to leave perhaps too easily. It was obvious that no one wanted her there, and, as much as she _did_ help, she was tired of not getting any credit for it. She wasn’t expecting a knighthood or a letter from the President or anything like that; a ‘good work, Skye’ would have been nice, though.

Climbing in and starting the engine, she saw May standing on the ramp of the plane, watching her. Skye sent her a goodbye salute before slamming the door shut and driving away, determined to put her S.H.I.E.L.D. life behind her.

*. . .*

Later that night, she was sat in the back of her van, huddled in an old blanket and thinking about the happy times she had on the Bus. She pulled out her laptop, typing a message to the team and thanking whoever was in charge of her stupid bracelet for allowing her to do so; she’d be damned if she sunk to their level and left without saying goodbye. She’d parked down a back alley just outside LA, thoroughly enjoying the three hours she’d spent driving alone.

She programmed the message to pop up on the big screen at nine A.M. in three days time, when the team would all have returned to the Bus for their briefing. She pushed the laptop away again, sighing as she leant her head back again the side of the van, her eyes drifting close.

Just as she was falling asleep, a heavy knock sounded at the side-door, snapping her from her doze. She wondered if it was the team, thinking they’d come looking for her when one of them realised all her stuff was gone, or when May had alerted Coulson of her departure. She shook her head at herself; she didn’t want to go back, and nothing anyone could say was going to change her mind; not that she expected the team to want her back anyway. Ignoring the knock, she pulled the blanket tighter, closing her eyes again.

“We know you’re in there, Skye,” the familiar voice that cut through the walls of her van moments later chilled Skye to the bone and her breath caught in her throat as she desperately fumbled with her phone to activate the deadlock she’d installed the last time she’d encountered him.

The door was thrown open milliseconds before she pressed activate, and Skye found herself wishing that it had been S.H.I.E.L.D. after all.


	2. Why Should I Help?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is still an AU so anything that isn't like how it was in the show is supposed to be that way because I have a creative license and am not afraid to use it. Enjoy!

Ward had been thoroughly enjoying his time off. He’d checked into a hotel, ignored eight calls from May, and had enjoyed somewhere around way-too-many glasses of assorted alcohols to actually care about anything.

“Drinking your troubles away won’t work you know.” He groaned as he recognised May’s voice.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“You ignored my calls,” she said, sitting down beside him at the bar.

“And you didn’t get the message?” Ward grumbled waving the bartender over, “I’ll have another one of... well, whatever the hell that was.” He said, shoving his glass towards the man.

“He’ll have a glass of water and then a coffee,” May butted in, her voice firm enough that the bartended decided (a very good decision, in May’s opinion) to do what she said.

“What, you think you can tell me what to do now?” Ward said, his face falling into a frown, “You’re _not_ my SO.”

“No, but you’re Skye’s SO, and she’s left. I’ll give you three guesses as to why.”

Ward rolled his eyes, “Because we were given some downtime? What do _you_ normally do when we get leave, _Melinda_? Stay on the Bus? Actually, that wouldn’t surprise me...”

“You’re an ass when you’re drunk, you know that?” May muttered, “Get a hold of yourself. Skye hurt you, I get it. She hurt all of us, because she lied. That’s in the past now, so get a grip, and sober up, before I try slapping some sense into you.” Ward glared at her for a moment before downing the glass of water that had been placed in front of him.

“So Skye’s gone,” he said after a minute of silence, “She drove off, I’m guessing? So what? S.H.I.E.L.D.’s tracking her every move because of her... bracelet thingy. Just get FitzSimmons to get a trace on her.”

“Do you know, that thought never occurred to me. Thank you, Ward, for that incredible idea.” Ward’s eyes widened.

“Were you just... did you just _sass_ me?!” he said, shocked.

“Fitz had a trace on her up until 21:52. After that, nothing. She either found a way to hack it, which would have been impossible with S.H.I.E.L.D. tracking her, or someone’s cut the feed.” May said, ignoring his comment as she stood up to leave, “Drink your coffee. She might have betrayed us all, but she’s a member of our team whether we like it or not. More importantly, you’re her SO, so you of all people should give a damn.”

Ward frowned, sipping his coffee slowly, “Give me one more reason why I should help. After what she did, with Miles, and the lying... why should I help her, after I trusted her with my secrets?”

May paused in her walking away, looking back at him with a knowing look in her eyes. “Because if you didn’t truly care about her,” she said quietly, he voice barely audible over the noise in the hotel bar, “Then it wouldn’t matter to you that she knew your secrets when you didn’t know hers.”

As she pushed the door open and left, Ward sighed, staring into his coffee.

“Dammit, May,” he groaned, practically falling off his stool and running after her.

* * *

Skye coughed as the bag was lifted from her head and she breathed in fresh air.

“Wow,” she said, smirking, “Sorry to break this to you, boys, but that’s not the first time I’ve been manhandled into a hot seat with a bag over my head!” The man in front of her looked amused.

“It’s good to know that S.H.I.E.L.D. hasn’t affected your habit of using sarcasm to cover up the fact that you’re way out of your depth.” His accent was unmistakably English; Skye would never forget such a distinguished, well-spoken voice, nor the absolute ass-hat it belonged to.

“Oh, that’s not me using sarcasm because I’m out of my depth. That’s me using sarcasm because you’re not worthy of having a serious conversation.” She said angrily, pulling at the rope (rope? Seriously, who used _rope_ nowadays?!) binding her hands behind her.

“Release her hands,” the man said, “She can’t do anything to us.”

“That’s what you think,” she snarled, “I’ve got one hell of an SO at S.H.I.E.L.D., Cameron. He taught me a trick or two.”

“Yes, I did wonder who they’d put in charge of you,” Cameron said thoughtfully, sitting opposite her, “I assumed it would be Coulson. He’s got a habit of picking up the young recruits. It’s a shame he only had two real successes, and one ended up committing several felonies. And the other... well, the other was Melinda May. How’s she enjoying flying the plane, by the way?”

“Oh, she finds it positively delightful,” Skye said, glaring at him as her hands were released.

“Again with the sarcasm,” he chuckled darkly, “Honestly, Skye, surely you remember that it won’t work with me?”

“Oh, I remember far too much,” she said quietly, “It was you, wasn’t it? I’ve had time to think, these last few weeks. Because, ultimately, it was down to you that I even infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. in the first place. Tell me, Cameron, when you left S.H.I.E.L.D. because you were a crappy agent, how big a grudge did you actually hold?” Cameron’s face darkened.

“How did you find out about that?” he muttered, “I hid that information where no one could find it, then destroyed the trail!” Skye laughed manically.

“Oh, that’s sweet, really it is,” she said, “But you really did underestimate a girl with an agenda. I want to know why I don’t have any information on my parents, Cameron. I reckon you can give me those answers.”

“You seem to be forgetting something, my dear Skye,” he said, standing up, “ _I_ am in control here. And _I_ want answers just as much as you do. Answers that can only be found in the depths of the S.H.I.E.L.D. database. You always were one of the most promising members of the Rising Tide. If anyone can get me what I need, it’s going to be you.”


	3. Where is She?

 “Where are we driving?” Ward asked, confused as he figured out that May was driving _away_ from the airstrip the Bus had landed on that morning.

“To the plane,” May said, “You didn’t finish your coffee.”

“So shoot me,” Ward rolled his eyes, “You moved the plane? And I swear to god, May, if you reply with another sarcastic answer I’m going to go ahead and assume that the world’s ending.”

May gave him a look from the corner of her eye, “When we found out that we’d lost the trace on Skye, Simmons was pretty adamant that we go and check out the last place we had a signal. It’s about three hours away by car, so we took the plane instead.”

Ward’s mouth dropped open, “We’re driving _three hours_ just to check out a site?”

“No, we’re driving one hour to get back to the Bus,” May said, smirking slightly, “I don’t plan on obeying speed limits. And you really should have had that coffee.”

*. . .*

When May and Ward arrived back at the Bus, FitzSimmons ran out with excited looks on their faces.

“We’ve got an idea,” Simmons said hurriedly, “It’s a long shot, and if it _is_ the Rising Tide like we think it is then we’ll probably come across a ridiculous number of firewalls and other protective computer-y things, but it’s a worth a go.”

“Do it,” May said immediately, locking the car.

“You alright there, Agent Ward?” Fitz asked frowning, “You’re, er... looking a little bit green there.”

Ward shook his head, “May... driving... alcohol... not a good combination.” Fitz nodded understandingly. “Where’s Coulson?” Ward asked.

“He’s right behind you,” Ward turned around as Coulson climbed out of Lola, slamming the door shut.

“Could you not slam things, please?” Ward begged, rubbing a hand across his head and wincing, “It’s too loud. Never again will I let May drive...”

“The headache is due to the alcohol, not my driving,” May reappeared with a second cup of coffee, “Drink it this time. Coffee is the best cure for a hangover.”

“May, catch me up,” Coulson said, ignoring the exchange between her and Ward, “I want to know why a piece of state-of-the-art S.H.I.E.L.D. technology has been offline for almost three hours.”

“About half an hour after everyone left this morning, I saw Skye get in her van and drive off. When I went back into the plane, I walked past her room and it was empty. Completely clear of anything that would tell us that someone had been living there for two months,” May frowned, “At first, I wasn’t really bothered; she pissed me off too. I thought that if she wanted to leave, we should let her.”

Fitz picked up the story, “At 2150 this evening, I got a notification on my laptop telling me that the feed from Skye’s tracking bracelet had stopped transmitting data. I played around with it, tried to get the signal back... I got nothing. The thing completely blanked out.”

“Technological malfunction?” Ward asked.

“Maybe,” Fitz shrugged, “But I thought I’d check the feed from Miles’ bracelet; there was a chance that there had been some kind of interference, solar flares for example, that stopped the bracelet feed. But Miles’ was still functional.”

“After we figured out that the issue was with Skye’s bracelet alone, we decided to fly over here-” Simmons was interrupted by a snort from Fitz and an eye-roll from May. “What?!” she demanded.

“Well, you weren’t exactly giving _us_ a choice in it, Jemma,” Fitz said carefully, looking slightly scared.

“From what I remember, you were threatening to fly the plane yourself,” May said, her voice emotionless.

“Can you _blame_ me?!” Simmons said angrily, “It’s been a month. A month since the entire incident happened with Miles and... we’ve all been treating Skye like... like... well, like _crap_. She hurt all of us by lying, but we were worse! We were mean and spiteful and...” she sighed, “It’s our fault that she’s gone. So it’s our job to get her back, safely.”

The people around her simply stared, slightly shocked by her outburst. Fitz eventually broke the silence.

“Right then,” he muttered, “So. We went to check out the last place any data was transmitted from her bracelet. When we got there, we found Skye’s van, but it was empty. She wasn’t in it, she wasn’t in the surrounding area and no one had seen her at all today. What we did find... was this.” Tapping the screen of his tablet, Fitz transported the message Skye left for them all onto the big screen.

 

_Hi, I guess. When you guys read this, you’ll probably have worked out already that I’m gone. I'm not really sure if you’ll care or not... but that’s not what I wanted to say._

_I wanted to say bye. Once upon a time, I felt at home with you guys, but that’s in the past. I don’t belong on the team anymore, and I guess that’s okay._

_Most of all, I really want to say sorry again. It was wrong of me to lie to you guys. Sure, it was kind of acceptable at the beginning, but I should have told you later on. But, just so you know, you’ve all been jerks the last few weeks (though, Jemma: thanks for actually looking at me and smiling once in a while. That meant quite a lot)._

_As much as I really want to hate you all, I don’t think I can; you’re family, no matter what. So, I want to say that I love you all, and... goodbye._

_Skye x_

_P.S. I suppose there’s some other stuff I can say now, seeing as I’m not coming back:_

_Coulson, you’re way too attached to old artificial things. You need to stop living in the past._

_Fitz, man up and ask Simmons out already._

_Simmons, act surprised when he finally does. And thank for... just being you._

_May... well. I don’t think there’s anything to say about you. You’re almost an open book. Maybe you should try being completely open once in a while._

_Finally... Ward, you’ve got one hell of a body. Keep up the good work._

The room fell silent again as the team let Skye’s words sink in.

“I’m not generally one to say I told you so,” Simmons said quietly, “But, this proves I’m right. We _were_ jerks.”

“We don’t have time to talk about that now,” Coulson said, “We can apologise and make it up to her when we get her back. First of all, are we sure she hasn’t just found a way to hack the bracelet? We’ve seen just how good her hacking skills are over the past few weeks; there’s a chance she could have found a way around it, isn’t there?”

Fitz shook his head, “The chances of her finding a way to cut the bracelet feed are less than one percent; there’re about eight different people watching the data from that feed at any one time; if she was using a computer for anything even remotely close to hacking the bracelet, we’d know.”

“So we’re assuming that someone else has hacked it?” Coulson concluded, “Well, that narrows it down. Have we got a list of possible suspects?”

“Yes,” Simmons said, lifting a large pile of paper onto the desk, “All members of the Rising Tide. That gives us around eight million hackers worldwide, 2.1 million based in the US, three hundred and twelve who have some sort of link to Skye. Of the three hundred and twelve, thirty seven are in prison after being uncovered by various organisations, fifty nine are currently out of the country and eight are dead. That leaves two hundred and eight possible suspects.”

Coulson whistled quietly, “Well, it looks like we’ve got a lot of work to do. We’d better get started.”

* * *

“Sooo...” Skye dragged the word out, watching Cameron pace in front of her, “Where are we, exactly?”

He smirked, “You should know better than to even bother asking me that.”

“Yeah, because I’m really going anywhere anytime soon,” Skye replied, gesturing around her. The room was grey and the door looked like it was deadlocked; nothing she couldn’t hack, of course, but it was more than impossible without a laptop.

Cameron chuckled, “You’re right, of course,” he said, “You’re not going anywhere until you agree to cooperate.”

“Well, I guess I could get used to this room,” Skye said, looking around and faking thoughtfulness, “I mean, a different shade of grey would be nice, but I suppose it’s not the _worst_ place to spend the rest of my life...”

“Oh, Skye,” Cameron retook his seat opposite her, which he had vacated almost an hour earlier, “It won’t come to that. Eventually, you’ll give in. I can promise you that.”

“That’s the thing about promises,” Skye said darkly, “They’re tough to keep.”

“Not when you’re the most powerful member of the Rising Tide,” Cameron said, tapping his fingers on the table, “Which I am. So, it looks like _you’re_ the only one with a problem here.”

“Oh, you’ve got a problem,” Skye said, standing up angrily only to be forced back into her seat by the men behind her, “An _attitude_ problem. Seriously, you’ve become even more of an ass-hat since I last saw you than you were when you first _started_ the Rising Tide. And I’ll tell you something, that’s one hell of an achievement.”

“And you’ve become a better hacker since _I_ allowed you into _my_ organisation,” Cameron smiled, “People change, it seems. Now tell me, because, really, we’ve been sitting here for over two hours and it’s getting rather late: do I have your cooperation?” Skye scoffed.

“Like hell you do.” She said bitterly.

“Hmm,” he frowned after a moment of silence, “You’ve changed more than I thought. There was a time when you embraced the Rising Tide’s methods, Skye, and our values along with it. Two months with S.H.I.E.L.D. and you’ve been completely converted. It’s really quite extraordinary.”

“Maybe that’s because I’m not a completely closed-minded douchebag.” Skye said, crossing her arms stubbornly.

Cameron sighed as he stood again, “Restrain her,” he told the men at the back of the room, “She’ll crack soon enough.”

“You sound awfully confident about that,” Skye told him, glaring at him as her hands were tied again.

Cameron chuckled quietly, the look in his eyes turning from confident to slightly unnerving, “Oh, Skye. You seem to have underestimated the things I’ll do for information,” he rested his hands on the table, leaning closer so that his face with centimetres from hers, “And I am willing to do _whatever it takes_ to get what I want from you.”

With that, he left Skye alone in the room to think over and panic about the words he’d just spoken.


	4. What Do You Want?

Skye fell asleep with her head on her shoulder, waking up the next morning when Cameron and his men walked in with an aching neck and a grouchy attitude.

“You know, I understand that I’m supposed to have been kidnapped and all, and that you’re trying to ‘break me’,” she said glaring at them, “But would it have killed you to give me a pillow?!”

“Good morning to you too, my dear Skye,” Cameron smirked, “Now, just tell me again: do we have your cooperation?”

“Oh, I _will_ tell you again,” Skye said, “ _Like hell you do_.” Cameron smiled evilly.

“I was hoping you would say that,” he said, gesturing to one of the soldier men he’d walked in with. Skye couldn’t keep the shock off her face as a hand connected with her cheek.

“You are one messed up son of a bitch,” she spat at Cameron.

“I prefer to think of myself as ‘determined’,” he said, “So, Skye: do we have your cooperation?”

“Asking me the same question over and over isn’t going to change my answer.” Skye said firmly. Though she was ready for the next hit, it still stung, and she was getting increasingly infuriated with the apparently constant smirk on Cameron’s face.

“We can do this one of two ways, Skye.” He said, “The easy way, or the hard way.”

“Well, at least S.H.I.E.L.D. is original,” she smirked slightly, “They don’t _have_ an easy way.”

As a fist came into contact with the side of her face, Skye realised that it was going to be a _long_ day.

 

* * *

 

The team worked through the night, only stopping at seven in the morning when Fitz almost passed out.

“We all need to rest,” Coulson said firmly, ignoring the glare Simmons was giving him, “We’ll get a few hours sleep and carry on later.”

Simmons turned away, crossing her arms angrily as everyone files out of the room. Ward paused at the door, looking back at her.

“Sim- Jemma?” Simmons looked up, slightly surprised at hearing anyone who wasn’t Fitz using her first name, “We’ll find her, you know that right?”

Simmons sighed, “We’ve narrowed it down to fifty suspects, and now we’re stuck,” she said downheartedly, “We’re looking at possibly the best hackers in the _world_ , Ward! How are we supposed to go up against them without...”

“Without Skye.” Ward finished for her, “Honestly, I don’t know. But... please don’t hate me for saying this, but maybe she went back to the Rising Tide? Maybe... I don’t know, maybe she’s trying to do whatever she was doing here from there now.” Simmons frowned.

“Did you ever find out why she was here?” she asked, “I think Coulson knows but... did he ever tell you?” Ward shook his head.

“I suppose it’s Skye’s business,” he shrugged, “We don’t need to know, and she obviously didn’t want us to.”

Simmons looked worried, “I feel like it’s important,” she said, “It’s been bugging me for a while. I was thinking about asking her but... I didn’t want to annoy everyone.” Ward sighed.

“You wouldn’t have annoyed us,” he rejoined her at the table, “Looking back on it now, we were assholes. No doubt about that. What makes you think that what she was doing here was important?”

She sighed again, “It’s just... she was here for a month before we found out. She helped us on every mission, didn’t doubt us at all, was more than happy to get involved, even risk her life. You trained with her; was there ever a time when she didn’t give it her all?”

“We had a shaky start,” Ward admitted, “She just wouldn’t commit. But after the incident with the 0-8-4, she was said she wanted to be in S.H.I.E.L.D. and she wanted it bad.” The more he thought about it, the more he understood what Simmons was saying.

“She liked being here,” Simmons continued, “She wanted to be on this team. So, whatever it was that made her come here in the first place, must be important to her. Everything she’s said and done whilst she’s been on this team indicates that she didn’t want to betray any of us. So it _must_ have been important if she risked her place here for it.”

Ward frowned; he was beginning to realise that, not only had they all been unacceptably cold towards Skye, they’d probably been doing without reason.

“This whole thing is messed up,” he muttered, “We need to fix it.”

“We need to find out why she was here,” Simmons said firmly, “We’re stuck in a hole. If there’s anything that can get us out of it, it’s what Skye was here for.”

 

* * *

 

A part of Skye wished that she’d never left S.H.I.E.L.D. the day before. Sure, everyone hated her and they were being bitchy, but it had to be better than being slapped silly because of a psycho ex- S.H.I.E.L.D.-agent hacktivist with a score to settle and a mission to complete.

Skye spat blood out of her mouth onto the floor next to her, “I grew up in foster care,” she said, “It’s unbelievable how many people in that system are assholes. It’s going to take more than a few punches to get me to cooperate.” Cameron raised his eyebrows.

“I can deliver on that,” he said, “I don’t particularly want to...”

“Well, that’s bullcrap.” Skye said, “You’re enjoying every second of this.” Cameron looked thoughtful.

“Well... yes, I suppose I am!” he grinned, “Now, are you ready to do what I want you to do, or do I have to tell Roger to get a metal bar?” Skye shrugged (a surprisingly difficult task with her hands bound to a chair).

“One day, you’ll understand that beating the crap out of someone isn’t going to get you your way.” She told him. Cameron chuckled darkly.

“One day, you’ll understand that I _always_ get my way.”

 

* * *

 

Ward wasn’t quite sure how to react to seeing Simmons on a mission. He wasn’t sure if it was a British thing or just a female thing (or maybe just a Simmons thing) but the entire situation was starting to scare the crap out of him.

“ _Fitz_!” she said loudly, banging on her partner’s door loudly, “Get up.” From behind the door, Ward could just about hear Fitz’s Scottish accent.

“Sorry, Fitz isn’t available right now, please leave a message and he’ll get back to you when he has slept enough to be coherent.” Simmons practically growled as she grabbed a tablet from a table in the lounge area, her fingers tapping the screen at a ridiculous speed until Fitz’s door opened.

“I have a question,” she said, walking in and shaking his shoulder. Fitz, not at _all_ comfortable with having a girl in his room, gaped at her.

“Jemma, it’s seven in the morning,” he whined, “I’ve been awake for twenty four hours. Can’t it wait until I’ve _slept_?!”

“No!” Simmons said, “Just _answer_ : do you actually know why Skye was here? Do you know what she wanted to do?” Fitz frowned.

“Err...” he rubbed a hand over his face, “No, I don’t think so. Coulson knows, but it’s Skye’s business. Why?”

“We think it’s important,” Simmons said simply, “Alright, now you can sleep.”

“Oh, well that’s awfully kind of you,” Fitz said sarcastically, pulling his covers over his head as Simmons left his room.

“Where now?” Ward asked.

“Kitchen,” Simmons said, “I need tea. Then Coulson.”

 

*. . .*

 

As Ward sat at the breakfast bar in the kitchen watching Simmons make coffee for him and tea for her, he frowned.

“Do _you_ think Skye’s gone back to the Rising Tide?” he asked quietly. Simmons paused for a second.

“No,” she said finally, “Whatever she was looking for, she obviously didn’t find it there. I think she just needed to be alone for a while.”

“As alone as you can be with a S.H.I.E.L.D. tracking bracelet.” Ward muttered.

“Which is why I’m sure something bad’s happened,” Simmons placed a mug in front of him, “She took that bracelet so that she could stay here. She knew exactly what she was getting herself in for. If the feed on it has gone dead, then something must have happened to it.”

“Unless she wanted to say goodbye to us for good.” Ward regretted saying it the moment it left his mouth. Simmons shook her head.

“When you love someone,” she said quietly, “No matter what they do or what they say, you’ll still love them. It’s not like a switch; you can’t just stop doing it whenever something goes wrong. She said in her goodbye message that we’re family to her. Of all the kinds of love there is, that’s the hardest to stop.”

Ward looked down, his eyes catching her mug, the string from her tea bag hanging at the side, “What is it with British people and tea?” he asked, trying desperately to lift the tension between them. Simmons smiled.

“It’s comforting for some reason,” she shrugged, “British people love their little comforts. It’s in our nature.”

They fell silent again, Ward stirring his coffee slowly with a spoon, Simmons lifting her tea bag in and out of the mug by its string.

“When we find her,” Simmons said suddenly, “Do you think, maybe... do you think she’ll forgive us?”

“Yeah,” Ward replied immediately, “I think she will. You said it yourself: family is family. There’s not much you can’t forgive when you love someone that much.”

 

* * *

 

Skye hadn’t quite been sure if Cameron had been joking about the metal bar. She knew he was borderline psychotic (if not _definitely_ psychotic) but that seemed a little far, even for him.

Skye, during her years as a member of the Rising Tide, had come into contact with Cameron several times. Each time, he seemed wilder and more daring than the time before. He was desperate to tell the world all about S.H.I.E.L.D. but, more importantly, he wanted to make money doing it. There was a reason she knew that no one with good intentions bought information; she had had first-hand contact with some of Cameron’s buyers, and never before had she spoken to a bigger group of nutcases.

Turns out, he wasn’t joking about the metal bar.

 _Great_ , Skye thought to herself, _nice one, Skye. This time you’ve really got yourself in shit._

“You can stop all this you know,” Cameron said, his voice completely calm as she coughed, her ribs aching after the bar came into contact with them for what felt like the hundredth time, “All I want is your cooperation.”

“Yeah,” Skye said, her voice strained, “My cooperation and all of the information that comes with it. I’m not selling S.H.I.E.L.D. out, especially not to you. You’re _insane_.”

“I was a member of S.H.I.E.L.D., Skye,” he said, leaning on the table with his hands spread in front of her, “I know the damage they can do! You saw the devastation after the Battle of New York! Your own SO died!” it took Skye a moment to realise that Cameron still thought that Coulson was her SO.

“And even that didn’t stop him,” she muttered, “I was a member of S.H.I.E.L.D. too. I’ve seen the good they can do as well as the bad. In the end, we’re _all_ the bad guys, Cameron. But there are the bad guys who want to help, and the bad guys who are just bat-crap crazy. And you certainly don’t want to help.”

Cameron sighed, “I’m getting bored of this, Skye,” he said, “It’s only a matter of time until I get very angry. And you don’t want to know what happened to the last person who saw me get angry.”

“You really are just a big old bag of clichés, aren’t you?” Skye said, resorting back to her wit to get her through, “Emphasis on the ‘old’. Is that a grey hair I see there?”

“I want that information,” he snarled, “And if it takes me messing up that pretty little head of yours to get you to agree, then that’s what I’ll do.”

Skye couldn’t work out what he was talking about until the bar hit her head and she blacked out.


	5. What Now?

“Wait,” Ward stopped Simmons quietly just before she started banging on Coulson’s door, “When May and I got back, you and Fitz said that you had an idea. What was it?”

“It was a long shot,” she admitted, “Fitz and I were going to try tracking everything the suspects we had were doing on their computers. It was a stupid idea really; we had over two hundred suspects and they’re all expert hackers. Chances are, if someone _has_ taken Skye, they won’t even be using their own computer.”

“But we’ve got less suspects now,” Ward pointed out, “And even if they’re not using their computer _now_ they could have used it to organise a kidnapping. It’s worth a go.” Simmons smiled, nodding.

“I suppose we can try,” she said, before turning serious again, “But we need to sort this out first. This is more likely to get us somewhere.” She turned around to knock just as the door was open, and Simmons and Ward were met by a weary looking Coulson.

“Whatever it is, can it wait?” he asked.

“We want to ask you something,” Simmons said, losing some of her determination for a second before regaining it, “About Skye.” Coulson sighed. He was still in his suit, minus his jacket and tie, the top button of his shirt undone. Simmons felt slightly guilty about preventing him from getting some rest; he looked exhausted.

“You want to know why she was here.” He deducted, waiting for Simmons’ nod before walking out of his room, walking up to his office and returning with the data card Skye had arrived with.

“What’s this?” Ward asked as Coulson handed it to him.

“Everything Skye had on her parents,” Coulson said, “Normally I’d be against letting you look at it when she wanted to keep it a secret, but it’s obviously important. What you’ll find on that chip are documents with the majority of content redacted by S.H.I.E.L.D. Skye joined to find out what happened to them.

“Don’t feel bad,” he continued, seeing the tears form in Simmons’ eyes and the look of shock on Ward’s face, “I thought she was getting information on us too. We all make mistakes. Had she told us in the first place, none of this would have happened. If we hadn’t been so harsh, maybe she’d still be here. All we can do now is get her back and hope that she’s safe.” With that, he left Ward and Simmons to themselves, trying to ignore the fresh wave of guilt that washed over him as he did so.

 

* * *

 

Skye’s consciousness returned slowly and painfully, and when she was finally fully aware, there were black spots dancing across her vision and what felt like a not-so-miniature marching band playing in a parade inside her head.

“Bastards,” she muttered, trying to lift a hand to her head before realising that they were still bound to the chair, “Fantastic.”

Just as she said this, the door opened, hitting the wall with a bang that reverberated through her head, “Ahh, it’s good to see you awake!”

Skye looked up, squinting slightly to avoid looking at the light, seeing Cameron grinning in front of her. “That was a nice move there, knocking me unconscious,” she told him, “I’m sure that really helped you. Well done!”

Cameron’s smile faltered, “Skye, let me make something clear to you: I have complete control over you. You can’t escape, you can’t contact anyone, you can’t even wipe your own blood from your face. I _own_ you.”

“You know, twenty-four hours ago, I thought S.H.I.E.L.D. had complete control over me. Nice work, hacking the bracelet. How did you know that it was S.H.I.E.L.D. technology? How did you know what it was doing?” Skye was slightly worried about the fact that her own voice seemed to echo in her head, but decided to ignore it; a concussion was the least of her worries.

Cameron smirked, “I knew because I’ve got one. They’re not difficult things to hack, when you’ve got someone to do it for you. Very few barriers to get to the mainframe system, and then a few clicks of a button: cancels the feed.”

“Why cancel the feed?” she asked, “Why not just the GPS? Without that, they can’t find me.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Cameron said, ignoring her questions, “You’re beginning to both waste my time and try my patience. The clock is ticking, Skye, and I need my information. How many more hits are you going to take before you give in?”

“Oh, I don’t know... ten? Eleven? I’ll see how I feel and let you know.” Cameron raised his eyebrows, turning to his guards.

“Do your worst.”

 

* * *

 

Ward and Simmons looked at the files on the chip in silence, neither of them trusting themselves to speak. Once they’d looked through all of them, Ward sighed.

“I can’t believe she let us be so mean to her when all she was trying to do was find out about her parents.”

Simmons was silent, standing in front of him so that he couldn’t see her face. When he leant forward to see why she wasn’t answering, he saw tears pouring down her face.

“She... after all that we did... she was trying to find out about her real family. She wanted to know who her parents were and we just... tossed her aside. We were the only family she had and we just...”

Ward put an awkward arm around her shoulder, being caught completely offguard when Simmons buried her head in his chest, sobbing. “We weren’t to know,” he said, trying his best to be comforting as he rubbed her back, “She didn’t want us to know.”

“We should have trusted her more.” Simmons said, her voice muffled.

“We _did_ trust her,” Ward reminded her, “And yet she didn’t tell us. She said so herself: she knew she was wrong. We’re _all_ in the wrong here.” Simmons pulled away, wiping her eyes.

“Sorry,” she murmured, looking embarrassed, “That was... unprofessional.”

“Nothing about this is professional,” Ward said, looking away from her to the documents that were still up on the big screen, “At least we know now. And I’m damned sure that this is important. You were right.” Simmons smiled slightly, her eyes still watery.

“So what do we do?” Simmons asked. Ward was silent.

“We wait a few hours,” he decided finally, “We’ll let the others rest. They obviously need it. If we can... we keep going. Maybe we can find the original documents. If not, we find out who redacted the information, when they did it and _why_. There’s got to be some kind of link in all this.” Simmons nodded.

“This is only one piece to the puzzle,” she agreed. Ward was instantly reminded of the case with the 0-8-4; Skye’s first case. She’d been obsessed with being a piece of a puzzle too. It struck him that maybe she wasn’t just defending the Rising Tide, but her own actions for joining it, and then joining S.H.I.E.L.D.

“Well then,” he muttered, “I guess we’ve got a puzzle to complete.”

 

*. . .*

 

They worked for hours, just the two of them, going from periods of complete silence to times of intense discussion, both of them thinking they’d found a new lead before reaching a dead end.

When the rest of the team joined them just after midday, no one questioned it; they simply dived right in, Ward and Simmons quickly catching everyone up before giving them something to do.

They followed up lead after lead, searching for the original documents with no success.

“This is ridiculous!” Fitz exclaimed after working for three hours, added to the four Ward and Simmons had already worked, “We’re getting nowhere. The original files must have been destroyed. That’s the only explanation.” The other four people all stopped what they were doing, none of them able to argue against him.

“Alright,” Simmons said, “Okay, you’re right. We’re not getting anywhere with this. We need to try a different approach.”

“Such as?” Coulson prompted. No one said anything, all of them trying to think of another way to approach the situation.

“I’ve got it!” Fitz exclaimed, snatching a laptop away from Ward, “You said there has to be some kind of link between Skye wanting to find her parents and the people who have taken her, right?” he asked.

“Yes...” Ward said.

“So... what if the link is _Skye’s parents_?” Fitz asked, “We’ve got fifty two suspects left with a link to Skye. How many of those are going to have a link to Skye’s parents as well?”

Simmons frowned, “That’d be a great idea, Fitz,” she said, “ _If_ we knew who Skye’s parents are. Which we don’t.”

“Ah, but you see,” he paused as he got their list of suspects up on the screen, “If we put the suspects in an order of how many times they’ve come into contact with Skye...” he quickly organised the list, “These bottom four she’s only ever dealt with online. Whoever’s taken her must have known her for years, if they knew her parents, which I’m assuming they did. Therefore, we can eliminate the bottom four.” He wiped the names from the list.

“What about the top two?” Ward said, “Who are they?” Simmons looked through the pile of paper in front of her.

“Err... James Keegan,” she started, “Sixty-two years old, old-time hacktivist, joined the Rising Tide about a year ago after being recruited by... Graham Cameron?”

“Is the Cameron guy on the list?” May asked.

“Nope,” Fitz said, “He started the Rising Tide. Anyone recruited by him supposedly has potential.”

“Who recruited Skye?” Ward asked. They all fell silent.

“We don’t know, do we?” Coulson asked, sighing, “That’s helpful. For now, put this Cameron as a suspect.”

“Another suspect, that’s all we need,” Ward muttered. They kept working, removing people from the list slowly.

“Numbers eight and eleven, and between thirty two and thirty nine can all come off,” May said.

“Why?” Fitz asked, “The first two have come into contact with Skye loads of times and the others are _huge_ in the Rising Tide.”

“They’re also all under eighteen years old,” May said, “There’s no way they could have known Skye’s parents, she’s been in foster care all her life.”

“I’d suggest removing eighteen and twenty four,” Coulson added, “They’ve got S.H.I.E.L.D. records, they’re being watched by secret services.”

“How did we miss all of this earlier?” Simmons muttered, “Take off forty two and nine,” she continued, “Nine is in a hospital eight months pregnant, forty two is in a mental institution, neither have internet access or visitors.”

“So we’ve got it down to... thirty nine?” Fitz said, “I can work with that.”

“What do you mean you can work with that?” Ward asked, “Do you even have anything to work with?”

“Well, what do we know about Skye’s parents?” Simmons asked, “We know they’ve been out of the picture for twenty four years, no longer than that because of Skye. We know that they came into contact with S.H.I.E.L.D. so they must have either been agents or a threat.”

“Have you tried cross-referencing the suspects with ex- S.H.I.E.L.D. agents?” May asked suddenly. Everyone turned to look at her, eyes wide.

“That’s... that’s genius!” Fitz said quietly, his fingers attacking the laptop keyboard, looking up after a moment with a ghost of a smile on his face, “... We’ve got three suspects.”

 

* * *

 

As Skye watched Cameron standing in the corner of the room through swollen eyes, she carefully tried to do a kind of inventory; she had six, no... seven broken ribs, at least. She obviously had a concussion (thank you, heavy metal bar) and, if she was going to guess, a fractured cheekbone and internal bleeding.

“I’m bored of waiting, Skye,” Cameron said, approaching the table slowly.

“So you keep saying,” she muttered, far too conscious of how much it hurt to talk, “ _I’m_ kind of getting bored of you saying it.”

She heard a click in front of head, glancing up to see a gun being pointed directly at her face.

“I’m done playing,” Cameron said, his voice deadly quiet, “You agree to help me, or I shoot you. Make a choice and make it fast. You’ve got ten seconds.”

Skye was annoyed at herself for actually contemplating.

“Ten.”

She knew that she should give in now. Cameron was insane. She had no doubt that he’d shoot her when he reached zero.

“Nine.”

But then again, would it really make a huge difference, to _anyone_? Who would care if she died?

“Eight”.

The team wasn’t coming for her. They never would, because they all hated her.

“Seven.”

She’d lied to them. She’d betrayed their trust. She’d led them all along, for weeks.

“Six.”

But what about her parents? She had to find out what happened to them, or everything, her betrayal; the lying; the trust she’d placed in the team and them in her... would be for nothing.

“Five.”

And the team. She loved them, she really did. Coulson was like a dad to her. May was a grouchy older aunt. FitzSimmons... annoying kid siblings. And Ward...

“Four.”

Well, she couldn’t say anything about Ward, except... she loved him. She wasn’t quite sure how much. But it was different with him. He’d taken her betrayal personally. She’d taken his reaction to her betrayal even _more_ personally.

“Three.”

If she gave in, she’d be betraying them again. If she gave in, then the team...

“Two.”

_The team_.

And idea formed in her head so quickly she was surprised it hadn’t been there all along. It was so blatantly obvious.

“One.”

“Alright.” She said quickly. Skye saw the look on Cameron’s face change from evil to triumphantly evil. He thought she was playing right into his hands. The truth was that he was playing right into hers.

“I knew you’d give in,” he said gleefully, “It’s a shame it came to this,” he continued, waving the gun, “But I knew it would happen, nonetheless.”

Skye smiled wanly, knowing that it would take all of her skill, both with computers and with lying, to get her plan to work.

She just hoped that the team had been paying attention during the last few weeks. For her plan to work, they’d have to know her better than they ever had before.

She hoped that they’d been watching. But more importantly, she hoped they still were.

 


	6. What's In a System?

Skye was led out of her little torture chamber with one of Cameron’s men holding each of her arms. Cameron walked ( _more like strutted,_ Skye thought to herself) in front of them.

She was led into what she could honestly say was the most impressive room she’d ever been in. Screens and consoles lined the walls, all of them somehow reacting to demands programmed from a large control system in the centre of the room.

“Woahh...” she breathed, “That’s one hell of a hacking station.”

“I’m glad you like it,” Cameron smiled slightly, “This is where you’ll be working from.”

“You haven’t told me what you want yet,” Skye told him, frowning, “I get that you were a tad busy beating the crap out of me, but I probably would have given in without the threat of a gun at my head if you’d told me what you wanted.” _Or maybe I wouldn’t have,_ Skye thought; but he didn’t need to know that.

“All you needed to know was that I needed information,” Cameron said, “Now that I have your cooperation, you can know more.”

“Well, that’s awfully kind of you.” Skye muttered. Cameron rolled his eyes.

“Do you ever stop with the sarcasm?” He asked, sounding slightly exasperated.

“Never now that I know it annoys you.” Skye smirked.

She was shoved in front of the big ‘hacking station’, and she looked back to glare at Cameron’s men before looking down at the screen on the consol. It reminded her of the big table in FitzSimmons’ lab back on the Bus, the one where they pulled out 3D objects and examined them, scrutinizing every part that she most definitely was not allowed to touch, _ever_ , but did anyway. She smiled a tiny smile at the memory.

“You know more about the S.H.I.E.L.D. database than any member of the Rising Tide has ever known,” Cameron said, pacing behind her, “You’ve had first-hand experience, been inside their system without fear of detection. You know how to get through their firewalls, you know how they categorise their information.

“What I need is everything they have on the Rising Tide and, more importantly: everything they have on _me._ ”

Skye laughed incredulously, “All of this for some self-centred vendetta you’ve got?!” she exclaimed, shaking her head disbelievingly, “I should have known.”

Cameron ignored her, entering a password into the control screen in front of her. “Get searching.” He said, his voice vicious as if he fully believed that she would fail. Skye sighed, glared at him one last time and turned to the screen.

“Completely Linux based system,” Skye muttered to herself, “How predictable.”

“Better to be predictable than to increase the risk of my system being hacked, hmm?” Cameron asked as she worked, seemingly working to find his documents, but actually beginning to set her trail.

“Some would argue that it makes hacking easier,” Skye told him, “With purely Linux systems, you’ve only got to know how to infiltrate one kind of system. If you have several different systems, you’ve automatically got more protection.”

Cameron looked slightly impressed, “Someone’s been doing her research,” he said, “Thanks for the tips.”

Skye grimaced, “You are _so_ welcome.” Ignoring everything he said from then on, she sent a silent prayer to whatever or whoever was listening (if she was honest, she was hoping for Thor; a god with a huge hammer could only work in her favour, right?) and got the work, trying her best not to imagine the outcome of her scenario if the team weren’t watching their server.

She sighed silently and, ignoring the searing pain that the tiny action caused her ribs, she continued with her work, hacking into any and all unimportant files as obviously as she could. If she was lucky, something she really _wasn’t_ feeling at that moment, the team would pick up her trail quickly.

If she was unlucky, she’d most likely end up with a bullet in her head before midnight.

 

* * *

 

“Three suspects?” Coulson checked, “Only three?” Fitz nodded.

“Three,” he confirmed, “A Sarah Wilkinson, Robert Calbraze and Graham Cameron.”

“I only know one as an agent,” Coulson said, “I thought Cameron sounded familiar. He was thrown out, about eight years ago. He was a terrible agent. One day, he pissed Fury off, so they chucked him out.”

“Fitz, what information do you have on the woman?” Ward asked, “I know we’re dealing with the Rising Tide and the majority of them are completely crazy, but aren’t the chances that Skye’s been kidnapped by a woman considerably lower?”

“Err... Sarah Wilkinson, thirty two years old, left S.H.I.E.L.D. when she got pregnant with her daughter eight years ago by another agent. He didn’t want anything to do with the kid, so she left S.H.I.E.L.D. to get away from him. She joined the Rising Tide five years ago when it first started, but she’s mostly just computer maintenance. She’s come across Skye a few times in person, a few times online, but it looks like their exchanges have been pretty simple and short...” Fitz moved to open another document on the woman but was distracted.

“Hold on,” he muttered, “There’s something wrong with the system...” before he could say another word, the door to his and Simmons’ lab swung shut, and the team heard the click of the lock sealing.

“That door’s mechanically operated,” May said, “It can only be locked from the system.”

“So how did it lock?” Coulson asked, “Fitz?”

“It _wasn’t_ me!” he said quickly, “Hold on, I’ll just-” a picture of a rabbit appeared on the big screen and the team gaped as other devices controlled from within the system began to work around the room.

“What the hell is going on?!” Ward shouted over the noise of Fitz’s laptop alarm blaring; the Scotsman had never regretted putting an intruder alert on his computer more.

“Someone’s hacked our system!” Fitz replied, “I don’t know how, I should have complete control!”

“I think we all know _how_ ,” Simmons said, “It’s Skye! This has her methodology all over it!”

“What do you mean her methodology?” Coulson asked.

“No, she’s right,” Ward agree, “I think we’ve all been paying more attention the last few weeks. This is exactly how Skye does things. She practically begs for the attention, then shuts the entire system down, giving her complete control.”

Just as he finished his sentence everything stopped.

Everyone fell silent, all of them secretly fearing the worst.

“Fitz?” Simmons questioned, “Why is your cursor moving when you’re not touching the mouse?”

“I’m, er... not entirely sure,” Fitz murmured, wiggling the mouse attached to the laptop, “I don’t seem to have any control over it.”

As the team watched, the mouse flew across the screen, opening file after file until a document on Graham Cameron was up on the big screen.

“Please tell me that was you and there isn’t a ghost in our system!” Simmons said desperately.

“I didn’t touch anything!” Fitz protested.

“This system is highly modified and practically _unhackable_! It was only updated a week ago by...” her eyes widened, “By Skye. Skye modified the system. _Skye is in the system_.”

“What?!” Ward exclaimed, “What do you mean she’s ‘in the system’?!”

“Are you saying she’s hacking us?” Coulson asked. In that second, not one member of the team could deny that they wondered if Skye really was working against them.

Then, just as they all started to really doubt her, the document on the screen was edited, words being added in front of their very eyes:

 

_Graham Cameron was dishonourably discharged from S.H.I.E.L.D. in 2005 after showing poor skills as an agent. Since then, he has become notoriously known as the man who started hacktivist group the Rising Tide, and is also an expert hacker **AND KIDNAPPER** himself. _

“Did that... was that document just changed to say that Cameron is a kidnapper?” Ward asked quietly.

“Er, yes. Yes it was.” Fitz stammered.

“Well, I think we’ve found our guy,” Coulson said, “Fitz, May, get to work on finding out as much as we can about him. I want properties, aliases, employees. Anything that might help us find Skye. Ward, Simmons, go and get some rest.”

“No, we’re fine, we can keep working-”

“We don’t need to _rest_ , we need to find Skye!”

“Honestly, we can go for a bit longer, we can sleep later!”

“Please, Coulson, just let us help-”

“You know,” Coulson interrupted the two of them, “I wasn’t actually giving you a choice. Go, now, both of you, or I’ll let Fitz have free reign with the Night-Night Gun.”

“ _We’re not calling it that._ ”

 

* * *

 

Skye had never been so glad that she was as good with computers as she was. Not thirty seconds after she’d altered the document, she saw whoever was in control of the S.H.I.E.L.D. system on the Bus looking up Cameron’s life, searching for aliases and properties.

Carefully, she began extracting small pieces of information on the Rising Tide from the database; small pieces of information that were well known to the public, and therefore wouldn’t be detrimental to S.H.I.E.L.D. Whenever Cameron or one of his guards glanced over her shoulder, she would bring up yet another pointless document.

As well as this was working for the time being, she knew that Cameron would grow impatient of the small documents she was bringing up between laying her trail for the team. She knew it was long, cryptic and unorganised, but she feared that if she made it any more specific, she’d be discovered. She worked methodically for an hour, deliberately renaming documents to try and make them look relevant, then sighing as if she cared that she wasn’t getting anywhere with Cameron’s task.

 “You don’t seem to be getting very far,” Cameron’s voice made her jump as she sensed him standing right behind her. Every bone in her body groaned with the sudden movement and Skye winced as she answered.

“Well, maybe it’d be a bit wiser to not give your abductees a concussion before shoving them in front of a big bright screen and expecting them to think clearly in future,” Skye retorted, “I’m doing my best.”

She was relieved when he sighed and walked away, leaving his men with strict orders not to distract her and to make sure she didn’t escape.

 _Good god is he stupid_ , Skye thought to herself, using the opportunity of freedom she’d been given to locate and switch on the system’s GPS. _That’s what the ass-hat gets for downloading GPS when he uses his single system,_ she though triumphantly.

Standing back, she continued flicking between documents, hiding them, bringing them back up again to make it look like she was actually making progress, when all she was really doing was biding her time, and hoping that the team would come and get her.

 

* * *

 

Ward and Simmons both took powernaps, both returning to the lab around forty minutes after Coulson sent them away.

“You said rest,” Ward pointed out when he saw that Coulson was about to protest, “So we did. And now we’re back.” Simmons nodded determinedly beside him and Coulson sighed.

“Never would I have thought that you two would work so ridiculously well together,” he muttered, “Never again.”

“Have you found anything?” Simmons asked, peering over Fitz’s shoulder. The man jumped, turning around to look at her disapprovingly. Simmons giggled quietly, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“We’re struggling a bit,” he admitted, smiling at her apology so that she knew he wasn’t really annoyed, “He’s got more than fifty properties under thirty different aliases, and his employees include the entirety of the Rising Tide. But... May thinks Skye’s leaving us a trail.”

“What makes you think that?” Simmons asked, dragging a stool up next to him and looking at the screen intently. Fitz was fully aware of the fact that their legs were currently touching, and that wasn’t doing anything for his productivity. May rolled her eyes.

“Some documents have words bolded,” she explained, “Random words, some of them not even in English. It could be some sort of code.” Simmons nodded.

“S.H.I.E.L.D. generally never bolds anything in their documents because they think all of it is important,” she said, “So if there are so many with bolded words, we could assume that Skye’s trying to spell it out for us.”

“Do any of the words you’ve found make any sense?” Ward asked, “There’s no point in trying to find the rest of the code if we don’t have some kind of order.”

“Well, that easy,” Simmons said distractedly, pulling up a file, “We’ll just look at the recently edited documents, all documents are saved twice, once to their original location and then again to an external folder so that there are always two copies of the most recently saved file.”

At this, Fitz groaned and May smiled slightly, “Why didn’t we think of that?!” Fitz exclaimed. Simmons gaped at him.

“So what _have_ you been doing for the last forty five minutes?!” she asked.

“Well... we were just flicking through files hoping to find more bolded words,” Fitz said, “It was a bit hit-and-miss to be honest.”

“Of course it was, you idiot!” Simmons said agitatedly, slapping his arm, “Some genius _you_ are!”

“Alright, that’s enough,” Coulson jumped in before the two launched into one of their well-known debates, “Just work on putting the code together.”

Simmons managed to do exactly that in less than ten minutes, “Wow, that was so incredibly difficult, I completely understand why you couldn’t do it, _Fitz_.” She said sarcastically.

“I said I’m sorry!” her partner replied sulkily, “Just read the stupid code.”

“Cameron kidnapped me,” Simmons read obediently, “Don’t know where. Code for security feed: 07838558912.”

“How did she find that?” May asked, “She’d have to be inside Cameron’s system.”

“Maybe she is in his system,” Coulson said, “Maybe that’s why he kidnapped her. He wanted information from inside S.H.I.E.L.D. Who better to do his dirty work than a girl who infiltrated the organisation to get exactly that?”

“Fitz get the feed up,” Simmons said, pushing the laptop in his direction and watching worriedly for it to appear on the big screen.

When the video appeared, she barely stifled a gasp. It showed Skye from the side, but Simmons could tell even from so far away that Skye was hurt. The way she was standing, the way she constantly glanced at the guards around her, never moving against their word... Skye was scared. And of all the things Simmons had seen Skye be, scared had not once been one of them.

Ward reacted differently; he _had_ seen Skye scared after all, when she was almost captured by Quinn’s men during the incident with Dr Hill. She’d been scared then, terrified even. But as he watched her on the screen, watching Cameron pace behind her, she wasn’t terrified. She was scared, definitely, and in pain if he was going to guess. But on top of that, she was waiting.

The team watched as Cameron approached her, looking as if he was going to talk.

“Can we get audio?” Coulson said quickly, “I want to hear what he’s going to say.”

“Yes,” Fitz said, “Give me a sec... done.” He turned up the volume for the speakers as they all listened in.

“... _getting very far_.” Coulson vaguely remembered Cameron’s voice from all those years ago.

“ _Well, maybe it’d be a bit wiser to not give your abductees a concussion before shoving them in front of a big bright screen and expecting them to think clearly in future. I’m doing my best._ ” Coulson and Fitz smiled slightly at her retort, but Ward and Simmons were listening too intensely to react. May remained as stoic as usual, watching the feed interestedly.

“ _Watch her_ ,” Cameron moved to walk out, “ _But **don’t** distract her. She has work to do._ ”

“Good lord, he’s an idiot,” Simmons said, running to the computer at the side of the room and typing hurriedly, “He left her alone and provided her with a perfect opportunity...”

“What are you doing?” Ward asked, moving over to watch her.

“Tracking Skye’s movements on that screen through the video feed,” Simmons muttered, “If I can find out what kind of system it is, maybe we could...” she smiled suddenly, then laughed happily, “Oh, she’s a genius.”

“What did she do?” Fitz asked, also moving over.

“She turned on the GPS,” Simmons said, still laughing, “Oh this Cameron guy is really stupid. He’s using a completely Linux based system. Years ago, you had to download GPS software but nowadays, for big companies with lots of computers worldwide, they just download the GPS when they install the hardware. She’s just told us exactly where she is.”


	7. What Did You Do?

Within ten minutes, Coulson had organised a S.H.I.E.L.D. SWAT team and they were driving at way-too-fast-miles-per-hour to Cameron’s research lab. The lab itself usually would have been half an hour away, but due to May’s extreme driving, they reached it in less than ten minutes, Fitz looking slightly worse for wear.

“Do you know what?” he muttered, “I don’t care how drunk he was, it was _definitely_ May’s driving that made Ward feel sick last night.”

“Fitz can you hack into the system and get the doors under control?” Coulson asked, checking his gun before holstering it.

“I think Skye’s beat us to it,” Fitz muttered, nodding towards the front door of the building, which had swung open as soon as the last car door was shut.

As Simmons pulled on a bulletproof vest, she turned around to see Ward holding a gun out for her. She frowned, “But... I haven’t had any training.” Ward shrugged.

“It’s easy,” he told her, “This is the simplest model you can get. Just aim and shoot. Easy.” Simmons looked worried. Ward placed the gun in her hand and closed her finger around it, “You’ll be fine,” he assured her, “It’s only a precaution anyway. With Coulson, May and me, I doubt you’ll have to use it.”

“Famous last words,” Simmons muttered, trying to ignore exactly how wrong the gun felt in her hand.

As Ward walked over to Coulson to discuss their entry strategy, Fitz slowly edged his way over to Simmons, “So... you’re going in with them?” Simmons nodded, looking worried.

“They shouldn’t be letting me,” she said quietly, “I think Coulson’s turning a blind eye because he knows how much I want Skye back. God, Fitz, what am I _doing_?!” she leant against the car, her head in her free hand. Fitz reached out to comfort her, pausing slightly with his hand halfway to resting on her arm before carrying it through.

“You’re trying to help a friend,” he said quietly, noticing how she lifted her head to glance at his hand, which was now resting comfortably on her upper arm, “You’ll be great out there and you’ll get Skye back. I believe in you, Jemma.” Simmons smiled.

“That’s... that’s really sweet of you,” she said quietly, bringing her own hand up to rest on top of his, “Thank you.”

Fitz smiled, “Any time,” he said, letting his hand drop, “And, hey, maybe afterwards... we could, maybe, get a drink or something?” Simmons smiled properly, glad that he’d taken notice of Skye’s goodbye message.

“Why, Fitz!” she said, faking surprise, “I never knew you thought of me that way!” Fitz blushed slightly as Simmons laughed, “I’d love to go for a drink with you.” She kissed his cheek, smiling at him once more before joining Ward, Coulson and May.

“Well, it’s about time.”

“Seriously, the amount of time it’s taken you two...”

“Congratulations,” Coulson said, smiling at her, “But we need to get going. I reckon we’ve got about three minutes to get to Skye and this compound is huge.” Everyone sobered up immediately, their faces turning serious as they made their way in.

 

* * *

 

As the guards around her started taking orders from their earpieces, several of them leaving the large room, Skye took that as her cue to start opening and closing doors all over the compound. Yet another advantage of Cameron using a single system: she knew exactly where to find the door controls.

Glancing around sweetly, she spoke to the guards behind her, “Is there something wrong?” she asked, faking innocence.

“Shut up,” one said gruffly, “Keep working.” Skye saluted him sarcastically, turning back to her control screen.

“Come on, Ward,” she muttered, hoping he didn’t hate her so much that he wouldn’t come to rescue her, “I’ve got a score to settle with you.”

 

* * *

 

“This is way too easy,” Ward muttered as yet another door opened for them, “We haven’t come across anyone. Not a single guard.”

“Maybe they’re all concentrating on guarding Skye?” Simmons suggested, “Whatever she’s doing is obviously important.”

“That’s possible,” Coulson agreed, “But there should be other staff. We should have alerted someone, _anyone_ by now.”

“Maybe we’re just lucky,” May said, “Don’t question it. If we run into trouble we’ll deal with it.”

“Was that Melinda May being the optimist?” Ward smirked, “Skye leaves and everything’s backwards...”

“Stop.” Coulson said suddenly, “Listen.” Beyond the door in front of them, they could hear the raised voice of Graham Cameron.

“ _What do you mean S.H.I.E.L.D. are outside?! How did they get our location?_ ”

“I think we _may_ have jinxed it,” Simmons said quietly, trying to keep her nerves under control.

“New strategy,” Coulson said, “Everyone, find a hiding spot. We’ll have to make a memorable entrance for the founder of the Rising Tide.”

 

* * *

 

It wasn’t long until Cameron burst in with a face like thunder.

“What did you do?!” he shouted across the room, “What have you been doing in my system?!” Skye couldn’t help but smirk slightly at his ignorance.

“You know absolutely _nothing_ about S.H.I.E.L.D.,” she said, not being able to stop the venom in her voice (as if she wanted to), “Yes, you may be an ex-agent, and maybe you know how they _used_ to work. But things are different now and no matter how much you torture me, no matter how many times you think you’ve got something over me, I will _never_ betray S.H.I.E.L.D., much less my team. Not again.”

She only just caught May sneaking in through the still open door before the woman disappeared, and Skye could have collapsed from the relief that her team had found her (or maybe that was just the concussion finally beating her. She couldn’t be entirely sure). Cameron smiled evilly, moving to the wall next to the door and hitting a button, causing the lights to go down before blaring red, claxons wailing.

“I’ve just locked down the entire building,” he told her, “Your team can’t get to you, even if they’re already past the front door. And even if one of them _can_ get through eight layers of reinforced steel, I doubt any of them can take on all twenty three of the guards in this room. You’re _trapped_ Skye, and I’m going to make you pay for what you’ve done.”

Skye smiled slightly, “You’re never completely trapped,” she said, letting the smile widen, “And you’ve obviously never heard of the Cavalry.” Before he could do so much as frown confusedly at her comment, he was collapsing to the floor unconscious. Never before had Skye been, a) more happy to see May, and b) more appreciative that Ward had been an insistent (which was code for pain-in-the-ass) SO.

As a guard tried to grab her from behind, she jabbed her elbow into his stomach, kicking him between the legs for good measure, knocking him unconscious with a well-aimed kick to the head. When she looked around, she found eight of the twenty-three guards already unconscious, and she hurried to lift the lockdown from the control screen.

It took her a full thirty seconds (twenty four seconds longer than her personal best, which astounded and worried her at the same time), but eventually the door opened and Ward, Coulson and... _was that Simmons_?! ran in.

The threat finally dealt with, and the realisation that her team had arrived, lifted a weight the size of Mount Everest from her shoulders, and Skye was dizzy with relief (or, again, was that the concussion?!).

“Skye.” The way Ward said her name made her open her eyes, though she couldn’t actually remember closing them, nor how long they’d been shut. All twenty-four of the people in the room were unconscious, and Simmons seemed to be having far too much fun tying them up.

Not being able to shake the feeling that it was beginning to feel like a scene from a movie, Skye moved to run to Ward, only for her legs to completely betray her as her body decided that, _no, enough was enough._ Ward caught her easily, making Skye grin.

“Don’t tell me,” she said, barely hearing her own voice, “You catch girls like this every day.”

Ward smiled, “Only the pretty ones,” he retorted.

“You don’t hate me?” she checked. Ward shook his head.

“ _You_ don’t hate _me_?!” he asked, frowning worriedly, “We were assholes to you, Skye...”

“Shut up.” She said, pressing her lips to his, “I’d say you’re family, but that would make this weird.”

“Well, for a second there I _did_ think that this situation was normal...” Ward said, his face so serious that it made Skye giggle.

“Ow,” she said, clutching her ribs, “Note to self: don’t laugh. It causes pain.”

“What did they do to you?!” Ward asked, “I’m not going to lie... you look like crap.”

“Ever the romantic,” Skye teased, “You’ll look after me, right? No matter what?” Ward looked confused as he nodded.

“Of course,” he said immediately, “Always.”

Skye smiled, “I was hoping you’d say that.” She managed before finally passing out, succumbing to her body’s wishes and drifting into the darkness.


	8. What Does That Mean?

It took Ward a moment to realise that Skye had gone limp in his arms.

“Skye?” he tapped her face lightly, “ _Skye_!” when he didn’t receive a response, he twisted his head round, “Coulson!” the man ran over, Simmons less than a step behind him, “She just passed out on me!”

“I’m not surprised,” Coulson muttered, “Fitz has called for an ambulance. She’ll be fine, Ward.” Ward looked between Skye, lying lifeless in his arms, and then back up to Coulson.

“Can you promise me that?” Coulson remained silent, knowing that, no: he couldn’t promise Ward anything of the sort, because the only people who could tell them what had happened to Skye were all unconscious.

“She’ll be fine,” he repeated instead, hoping to God that he was right.

 

* * *

 

Ward insisted on carrying Skye to the ambulance when it arrived. He insisted on riding with her to the hospital. He told Coulson that he wouldn’t leave her side until she told him that she was fine. The last the group saw of him was him sitting beside her in the ambulance, holding her hand tightly.

As the remaining members of the team watched the ambulance drive off, Simmons ran to the car and climbed in the driving seat.

“Well?” she called out the window, “Are we following them, or not?!” Fitz looked to Coulson with wide eyes.

“Is she serious?!” he asked. Coulson shrugged.

“Apparently...” he said, “Well... I guess Simmons is driving.”

“Can she even drive?!” May asked, sounding sceptical.

“She passed her driving test,” Fitz offered, “... In England.”

“She has a US license, right?” Coulson asked, pausing before opening the door to the front passenger seat. Fitz shrugged. Coulson raised his eyebrows, “Well... that’s reassuring...”

 

*. . .*

 

“Er, Simmons?” Coulson said, “We drive on the right in this country.” Simmons hurriedly swerved onto the right side of the road.

“Oops,” she said sheepishly, “I haven’t driven in a while...”

“You’re also going at... a hundred and eight miles per hour,” he noted.

“Is that too fast?” she asked, frowning slightly.

“I suppose not,” Coulson said, “It’s about thirty miles per hour over the speed limit, but that’s okay.”

“Sorry,” she said, slowing down.

“You do have a US drivers license, don’t you?” he asked. Simmons glanced at him.

“Errmm... yep. Of course I do. Definitely have one of those...” Coulson sighed.

“That’s our priority whilst Skye is recovering,” he said, “You’re getting a US license.”

“Or I could just never drive again,” Simmons offered, “That would work better.” Coulson smiled.

“I figured you might say something like that.”

 

* * *

 

When they arrived at the hospital, Simmons literally abandoned the car outside the doors of the ER, rushing in without another word to anyone. May quickly climbed in the driver’s side, nodding to Coulson as she went to park the car.

Simmons found Ward sitting in the waiting area, looking worried and impatient.

“Where... where is she?” Simmons asked, almost not wanting to hear the answer.

“In surgery,” Ward said, rubbing a hand over his face, “I can barely even remember what the doctor said... eight broken ribs, suspected punctured lung, severe concussion... They’re about seventy percent sure she’ll make a full recovery, provided the surgery goes well.” Simmons sighed in relief.

“So, good news?” she asked. Ward nodded.

“I guess it is,” he replied, looking down the corridor at the doors that Skye had been taken through half an hour previously.

“Why do you still look worried, then?” she asked, her worry increasing again. Ward shook his head.

“I don’t know,” he said, “It’s probably nothing. I’ve just got one of those feelings that the world hasn’t stopped screwing with us...”

 

* * *

 

When Skye came out of surgery, she was wheeled into a private room. Ward and Simmons immediately took up positions on either side of her bed, each of them holding one of her hands, though both with different intentions.

Simmons couldn’t stop thinking about how she still hadn’t apologised to Skye. Neither she, nor Ward, had listened to a word the surgeon had said when they brought Skye out of surgery, but she managed to catch the words ‘she’ll make a full recovery’, and even that wasn’t enough to calm her guilt. The same question was plaguing her constantly: what if Skye _didn’t_ make a full recovery, and Simmons didn’t get a chance to say sorry?

Ward, on the other hand, was replaying the scene at Cameron’s lab. He hadn’t expected her to tease him the second she fell into his arms. She’d been distant, but still the same Skye, never losing her wit. He vaguely wondered why she hadn’t passed out there and then; the state she had obviously been in should have made that happen. But she stayed awake long enough to make sure he’d stay with her... _long enough to kiss him_. That part in particular kept coming back. Skye had _kissed_ him. What did that even _mean_?!

Neither of the two had answers to their questions, and were determined to stay with Skye until they did.

 

*. . .*

 

The first thing Skye became aware of was the beeping of the machines around her. As her consciousness returned more, she was aware of a hand clasping hers, and weight on the opposite side of the bed. Confused, she opened her eyes slowly, blinking against the bright lights, turning her head and being met by a very relieved looking Ward.

“Hey,” he said, quietly, his hand still holding hers, “How are you feeling?”

“That’s a really good question,” she muttered, wriggling, “Well, my ribs hurt. And I’ve got the mother of all headaches. But other than that... Yeah, I’m good.” She looked to her left to see Simmons asleep, her arms crossed on the bed and her head resting on them.

“She hasn’t left since you got in here,” Ward told her quietly, “Neither have I.” Skye smiled slightly.

“What time is it?” she asked, trying to look out the of the window to see outside.

“Half four in the afternoon,” he said, “You were in surgery for two hours. You’ve been out ever since.” Skye looked at his face, noticing the bags under his eyes and the constantly tired look her was wearing.

“When was the last time _you_ slept?” she asked, “Not going to lie... you look like crap.” Ward smirked.

“Using my lines against me?” he said, “Ever the romantic.”

“Hypocrite,” Skye grinned back, nudging him with her free hand before turning to Simmons, poking her arm, “Simmons? Hey, Jemma?” Simmons lifted her head groggily, brightening up immediately when she saw that Skye was awake. She threw her arms around her, hugging her tightly.

“Thank _god_ ,” she said, “I’m _so_ sorry, Skye. For everything. We were horrible and spiteful and wrongly so especially because you didn’t _really_ do anything wrong and-”

“Woah,” Skye stopped her, “Slow down. Firstly: ouch, ribs, still healing.”

Simmons chuckled, tears in her eyes, “Sorry.”

Skye shook her head, smiling back at her, “Secondly... I’m not mad at you, any of you. You don’t need to apologise.” Simmons frowned sadly.

“Yes... we do,” she said, “We... we know why you did what you did. We know about your parents.” Skye’s face fell slightly before she sighed.

“I’m surprised Coulson didn’t tell you straight away,” she said quietly, immediately becoming more subdued, “But it doesn’t make what I did right,” she said firmly, “I should have told you guys.”

“Everyone’s entitled to privacy,” Ward said, “We shouldn’t have judged you when we didn’t know the full story. That was worse than what you did.” Skye smiled slightly.

“You guys _were_ jerks,” she said, “But I suppose I can forgive you. You did rescue me after all. Thanks for that, by the way.” Ward smiled.

“Any time.” Simmons stifled a yawn, trying to hide it from Skye, who was apparently all-seeing.

“You should go,” she said, “Get some rest. I’ll be fine.”

And they were the words Ward _really_ wanted to hear.

 

* * *

 

Despite Skye’s protests, he refused to leave her alone.

“I’ll stay until Coulson comes back,” he said, “Then I’ll leave. I promise.” Skye sighed theatrically.

“You just can’t take a hint, can you?” she said sarcastically, laughing as much as her now healing ribs would allow. They fell into a comfortable silence, Ward still holding her hand, rubbing circles on the back of it with his thumb. Simmons had gotten a taxi to the airstrip ten minutes ago, promising to send Coulson over so that Ward could get some rest.

“So, er...” Ward knew he was stupid for branching into an awkward topic so soon, but he didn’t know when he’d next be alone with Skye, and he needed more answers, “You kissed me.” Skye smiled.

“Yes, I did.” She said simply. Ward waited for her to say more and got nothing in return.

“Well... what does that mean?” he asked, trying to hide his confusion.

Skye shrugged, “What do you want it to mean?” Ward looked at her, beginning to get frustrated until she started laughing.

“What?!” he asked, “What’s so funny?” Skye shook her head, still laughing.

“You really are clueless, aren’t you?” she asked. Ward sighed, trying to hide a smile.

“I’ve never really been kissed by a girl before,” he said, “Not one that mattered, anyway. I’ve had flings on missions, but... never one that I thought could actually _go_ somewhere.” Skye calmed her laughter, touched by his words.

“I matter to you?” she asked. Ward nodded.

“Quite a lot, actually,” he said, starting to feel awkward again, “I mean, when May first said that you left, I didn’t really care, but... then she said something that showed me that I do care about you. And then when I found out about your parents and we realised how wrong we’d been towards you, I felt so guilty, and...” he sighed, “Just... it was weird without you. Everything seemed backwards.” Skye squeezed his hand.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” she said quietly, “I’m back. If you’ll all have me. And... I was kind of serious, when I said you had a nice body. And... I kind of kissed you because... well, I like you, I guess.” Ward smiled, finding her embarrassment highly amusing as she looking down at her hand in her lap, blushing slightly.

“Skye?” she lifted her head up to see him leaning in, before kissing her softly. She smiled through the kiss, resting her free hand on his shoulder, the other still holding his.

“Yeah?” she asked when he pulled away. He smiled.

“I kind of like you too, I guess.”


	9. What's Wrong?

Ward drove Skye back to the Bus two days later, the latter of the two staring blankly out of the window, her head leaning on the cold glass.

“Are you okay?” Ward asked. Skye glanced at him, offering him a fleeting nod as she smiled before turning back to the window.

Ward was worried about her; not physically, because he knew now that she would be absolutely fine. But the state of her mental health was a different matter entirely.

He assumed that she’d been tortured, to some extent. She didn’t receive the injuries she had just by saying ‘no’. So Cameron _really_ wanted information, and was willing to go to the extremes to get it. But, as far as they knew, she hadn’t leaked any information about S.H.I.E.L.D. He wasn’t quite sure how that made him feel; guilty he supposed, because they really _had_ been ridiculously harsh towards her for four weeks for absolutely no reason, not to mention judging her constantly because they’d all thought that she was trying to destroy the organisation from the inside.

But, at the same time, it made him immensely proud, both as Skye’s SO and as her... _boyfriend_? Is that what he was now?

During the two days Skye had spent in hospital, she’d become progressively quiet. She’d lost some of her wit. She was still sarcastic, but not in the jokey way she normally was. She didn’t start up a conversation. And whenever Ward held her hand, she squeezed it so tightly it was as if she thought that, if she didn’t, he’d vanish into thin air.

Skye had _changed_ , and Ward didn’t know why. And that frustrated him just as much as it worried him.

 

*. . .*

 

Skye took in the outside world as Ward drove, feeling like it had been an age since she last saw it. She saw a forest and decided to go for walks outside more. She’d never really appreciated little things like that.

Every so often, she’d glance at Ward to see him focused on the road, his hands tapping the steering wheel rhythmically. She’d smiled slightly, because it amused her, then fell back into her own thoughts. She knew that that was probably a mistake; her thoughts weren’t the happiest of places at that moment in time.

She’d annoyed herself, more than anything, by letting Cameron kidnap her. She’d installed a _deadlock seal_ on her van, for goodness sakes! And the man had still managed to take her, lock her up, beat her to a pulp and then threaten to shoot her.

Skye wasn’t really sure how to picture the moments she’d spent with a gun pointing at her head; it had been a turning point for her, to say the least. That was the moment that would have made everything different. Had she decided to just give up, she wouldn’t be sitting in a car with Ward as his... _girlfriend_? Was that what she was now?

Everything had happened way too fast; she could barely keep the events straight in her head, though that might have something to do with the metal bar that had so kindly made her head’s acquaintance. All the same, she remembered every thought she’d had whilst the gun was pointed at her, and she couldn’t help but feel ridiculously weak every time she thought of the moment where she considered letting Cameron shoot her.

She seemed to forget everything else, such as how she pulled herself back both for herself and for her team. She was focused on that moment of weakness, unable to forget how ready she was to die at the hands of a completely insane ass-hat.

Skye had changed, and only she knew why. Her thoughts frustrated her just as much as they terrified her.

 

* * *

 

Ward pulled the car up onto the ramp of the plane, climbing out and walking round to help Skye.

“You okay?” he asked, this time inquiring about her physical state. Skye smirked.

“He broke my ribs, not my legs, Ward. I think I can manage walking upstairs.” Ward smiled almost sheepishly.

“Right, sorry,” he said, instead opting to take her bag out of the back of the car, which Simmons had so lovingly packed the morning before.

“Where is everyone?” Skye asked, finding FitzSimmons’ lab empty. Ward shrugged, genuinely confused as to where the rest of the team was.

“Upstairs, maybe?” he offered. Skye nodded, taking his hand without even thinking about it and leading the way up the spiral staircase.

When they reached the lounge area, Skye was scared out of her skin by the large shout, mainly due to Fitz and Simmons, who were holding the biggest cake Skye had ever seen.

“Welcome back!”

Skye laughed, the first proper laugh she’d emitted since she’d first come round from her surgery, looking at the two with her eyes bright.

“I probably should have guessed you wouldn’t just let me walk in quietly, shouldn’t I?” she asked, hugging Simmons back when she wrapped her arms around her.

“Yes, you should,” Simmons replied, chuckling, “It’s good to have you back.” Skye smiled.

“It’s good to be back,” she replied, only Ward realising that the smile on her face when she said it didn’t quite reach her eyes, “Properly back, I hope?” Skye said, leaving the question hanging as she looked to Coulson. The man smiled.

“Properly back,” he agreed, “After that display at Cameron’s lab, I’m pretty sure the president wanted you for his security team, but I said you already had a work placement.” Skye laughed.

“Well, I’d rather _you_ turned down the President than me,” she said jokily.

For a moment, Ward thought she was fine, that she’d just been nervous about coming back before, and now that she was relaxed with her friends Skye had gone back to normal.

But he’d been right; the world really hadn’t finished screwing with them.

 

*. . .*

 

Skye’s ‘Welcome Back’ party was well underway, and the subject of the event was currently talking to Fitz, enjoying a slice of cake.

Coulson coughed loudly, getting the team’s attention, “I have an announcement,” he said when the group fell silent, “Though we don’t know the full story of what happened at Cameron’s lab, the best of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s agents were unanimous in the fact that Skye behaved admirably under an extreme amount of stress and portrayed incredible skills when faced by the threat of danger. For that reason, Skye, they want to award you an award for Bravery and Courage, alongside offering you a full-time job on this team.”

Skye almost dropped her cake in shock. FitzSimmons turned to her with excited looks on their faces, only to be met by a look of pain and disappointment.

“I... I’m sorry, but... I can’t accept that,” Skye said quietly, “I just can’t. I’m sorry.” She ran from the room, throwing her cake on the table as she went. Ward raced after her before Simmons could even move.

“I think Ward’s got it,” Coulson said quietly, reaching out an arm to stop her as she went to go after them. Simmons looked conflicted, but yielded as Fitz put a hand on her shoulder. No one was particularly sure how it had happened to quickly, but FitzSimmons had become even closer since rescuing Skye, and Simmons looked to Fitz for support as she wrapped her arms around him, sniffling but not quite crying.

“What do you think that was about?” May asked Coulson quietly when he walked over. Coulson sighed.

“I think I said it,” he admitted, “We don’t know the full story of what happened at Cameron’s lab. We don’t know what he did to her, nor what he said. If Skye doesn’t want to talk about it, we can’t force her to, but...”

“If anyone can get some answers, Ward can.” May finished for him.

 

* * *

 

Ward found Skye in the back of the car, her knees brought up to her chest with her arms hugging them tightly. He opened the door quietly, slipping in beside her, not saying a word as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders. Skye immediately leant into his embrace, holding onto his shirt tightly as she sobbed into his shoulder.

He stayed silent, letting Skye get all of her emotion out and waiting for her to make the next move. He rubbed her arm comfortingly, wondering how this came so much easier to him with Skye than it had with Simmons three days previously.

 _You don’t love Simmons_ , the voice in his head said. As soon as this realisation hit him, he pulled Skye closer, kissing her head softly.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled into his shoulder after a while, “You must think I’m being an idiot.”

“I think you’re reacting exactly how you should be after being held hostage and beaten up,” he corrected her, pausing for a moment, “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not particularly,” Skye said quietly, pulling away. Ward sighed.

“So you’re just going to push me away?” he asked, not letting any accusation slip into his tone. Skye looked upset at his words.

“I don’t want to,” she said desperately, “I just... I don’t want to talk about it. It makes it seem so much more real and I just want to forget.”

Ward had never seen her so vulnerable. He’d like to think that he’d gotten to know her more in the last two months than he’d ever learnt about anyone in his life. He knew it sounded cheesy to say that there was ‘just something about her’ that brought him in, but Skye truly was extraordinary.

“Maybe forgetting isn’t the way to go,” he said quietly, “I told you about my brother. How I had to learn how to fight to protect myself and my younger brother from him. He was a bastard, no doubt about that. But do you think that, if I’d just forgotten about all of that, then I’d be the person I am now? Because I don’t.” Skye finally looked up, meeting his eyes properly for the first time ever, letting him see the pure emotion that currently resided there.

“You’ll think I’m stupid,” she said quietly, “You’ll think I’m weak.”

“I’d never think that,” Ward said, “I’m _proud_ of you, Skye. You went through a lot and you’re ready to bounce back. Nothing could make me think less of you.”

“You thought less of me before I left,” Skye said, looking down again. She knew it was a low blow, but she figured she deserved that at least. She hadn’t completely forgiven the team after all. Family or not, they’d ultimately cast her out, forcing her to leave, and it took time to forgive that.

Ward visibly winced at her statement, knowing that she wasn’t even exaggerating; she was stating the harsh truth of the situation that had caused their entire dilemma.

“I know,” he replied, “And never have I regretted anything more than I do that. But, believe me when I say that I want to make it up to you, Skye. I really, _really_ do. I need you to tell me how.” Skye sighed, laying her legs on top of his with her head on his shoulder, essentially sitting in his lap. His arm wrapped around her instinctively, making her smile.

“I guess, if you know that you were wrong... that’s bad enough, right?” she asked. Ward laughed humourlessly.

“It’s a terrible feeling, if that’s what you mean,” he said. Skye smirked.

“I suppose that’s punishment enough.” She said, falling silent. Ward played with a lose strand of hair that had fallen out of her ponytail and fallen down her back, twisting it around his finger absentmindedly.

“Cameron threatened to shoot me.” Skye said after a while, her voice barely audible.

Ward took a moment to work out how to respond, “But he didn’t.”

“Only because I promised to cooperate,” Skye told him, “I knew that the only way I could get you guys to find me was to get inside his system. Even after everything, there was a part of me that knew you’d be looking for me.”

“We’ll always come looking for you, Skye,” Ward said, almost astounding himself with the truth of the statement, “You’re a part of our team.”

“That’s not the point I was trying to make, though,” Skye said, not begin able to stop talking now that she’d started, “Because he gave me ten seconds to agree to help him. Ten seconds with a gun pointed at my head, with a concussion and broken ribs and... As he counted down, I felt like I was thinking all of the important things in my life at once. I knew that I should give in and help him, because if I was at a computer I would work out how to escape, and I had no doubts that he’d shoot me if I didn’t agree. But then... I was so down and I felt so helpless that... I thought, just for a second that maybe I should let him kill me. Because I thought you guys hated me, and I hadn’t even been able to find out about my parents and I had no one in the world on my side...”

Ward kept his shock and sadness at Skye’s words hidden, letting her talk to her heart’s content; he’d been in her situation before. He’d been held hostage, he’d been threatened, he’d been tortured; that was the reality of the job. The harsh, uncommon reality, admittedly, but the reality nonetheless. On top of that, he _knew_ Skye, and he knew that what she really needed was to get her thoughts out of her head.

Skye paused for a moment, wiping fresh tears from her face, “But then... I thought of you guys. I thought of all the cases we did together, the early ones, the ones where we had happy endings. And I thought about how, if I died, I’d never find out anything about my parents, and the pain I caused all of you by lying would just be for nothing. And then I started to realise that... you guys _are_ my family. You’ve been there for me since the start of all this, and then, after I lied, I was still there for you when you guys needed me. And... I just couldn’t bare the fact that, if I died, I’d just be betraying you all over again by not trusting you to find me.”

Skye hadn’t cried so much since she was a little girl, which, she realised, wasn’t that long ago. The shoulder of Ward’s shirt was soaked with her tears, but his arm, protectively around her, let her know that he didn’t mind. He caught a tear falling from her eye, kissing her head again comfortingly.

“None of that makes you weak,” he told her quietly, “Believe me, I’ve been there. I know what goes through your head. When you’re faced with that situation, you think that stuff and that’s okay. Because you pulled yourself back. You reminded yourself of what’s important and now you’re back with us and you’re safe. And none of us are ever going to let you go again... especially not me.”

Skye looked up, “Really?” she sounded so young, so vulnerable that Ward wasn’t sure whether to chuckle or actually take her seriously.

Instead, he kissed her, hoping that he answered her question in the gesture as opposed to answering it with words. From the smile she gave him in return, the first proper smile she’d given him in a while, he figured that he’d given her exactly the answer she was hoping for.

 


	10. What More Can I Say?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I figure I've kept you waiting long enough! Look out for the following one-shots and the sequel, if I ever get round to it!

Ward and Skye’s relationship progressed slowly. She was still recovering from being abducted, and that in itself was a slow process. He understood this, and was always there for her when she needed him.

This wasn’t to say that they didn’t both participate actively in the relationship; during the weeks following the incident with Cameron, Coulson walked in on a compromising scene a total of eight times, asking casually if he was interrupting and being forced out of the room by the embarrassed shouts of both Skye and Ward. On several occasions, May told the two to get a room after a few too many instances of PDA, and Fitz and Simmons were almost as bad, but much, _much_ subtler. Skye’s excuse was that they had the privacy of their lab, and Coulson offered them the weapons room near the back of the plane. Skye and Ward didn’t hesitate to take advantage.

However, more nights than not, Skye would creep into Ward’s bed just for the comfort of having him near her, knowing that he would keep her safe. She knew that her worrying was completely illogical; Cameron was going to prison for a long time, and if he ever got out, he’d go straight into a mental hospital (seriously, the man was a raving lunatic!). She was more than aware, though, of the vast number of enemies she had made throughout her rather short lifetime, and Cameron taking her from the place she’d felt safest, from inside her little van, had made her feel exposed and vulnerable to attack at any moment. Except when she was with Ward.

She knew it sounded like a stupid old movie, but she’d fallen for him hard and fast; maybe it was because she’d never had someone in her life who loved her enough back to want to protect her. Maybe it was because she knew Ward better than she’d ever known anyone. Maybe it was because she trusted him before she realised exactly what her true feelings were.

Or maybe, just maybe (if she was going to believe in fate and destiny and all that crap), they were meant to be together.

 

* * *

 

When Ward got ready to go to bed one night, roughly a month and a half after Cameron had been locked away, he entered his room to see Sky already in his bed, curled up in a tight ball and cocooned in his duvet covers, sound asleep and snoring quietly. He couldn’t help but smile at her; she was an adorable sleeper.

“Skye?” he whispered, regretting having to wake her, “I don’t mind you borrowing my bed, but at least leave me a little bit of room.” Skye smiled sleepily, not opening her eyes as she shuffled over and let him slide in next to her. She instantly curled into him, making him laugh as she practically nuzzled into his chest.

“Your bed’s nicer than mine,” she mumbled as Ward wrapped his arm around her. He chuckled almost silently.

“And why’s that?” he asked, stroking her hair.

“Because I’m not in it alone,” she replied, “I still get scared that someone’s going to come a take me. I know you won’t let that happen.”

“It’ll happen over my dead body.” He agreed. Skye wanted to say something then; those three words she’d said so often as a child, only to have them thrown back at her as she was abandoned yet again. She just couldn’t find the strength to risk that happening again.

Ward sensed the sentence hanging in the air. He could leave it; it probably _was_ too soon, and he was sure than neither of them wanted to get hurt by saying those words prematurely. But he wanted to say them so much. He’d never had anyone like Skye, as a friend or something more. It was a first for both of him and he was more than happy to let it last forever.

“Skye?” he said quietly, thinking she’d fallen asleep.

“Hmm?” she replied immediately. He smiled slightly.

“I love you.” Skye sat up quickly, her face shocked but happily so. She kissed him fiercely, with more passion than she had in the last six weeks.

“I love you too.” She said, a tear falling from her eye. He caught it with his finger as he had done when Skye had first returned.

“Why are you crying?” he asked. She shook her head, laughing.

“It’s stupid,” she replied, “I’ve just... no one’s ever said that they loved me before. They’ve said that they want me to be a part of their family and that they want to look after me, but... Whenever I’ve said it, no one’s said they love me back.” Ward kissed her again before holding her tight.

“I will always love you back, Skye,” he murmured in her ear. He didn’t need to tell her that he understood, and she didn’t need to tell him that she knew how much he needed her.

Neither of them had had the best of starts to life. But they were sure as hell going to make sure that the other never had to go without someone to love, and someone to love them back, again.

Whether they believed in fate or destiny, or any of that crap, or not, there was something about the two that just made them _right_.

So maybe they really _were_ meant to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there's that. Leave a comment if you fancy making my day and thanks to anyone and everyone who gave this a read!


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